Chapter 78. Parts of a Puzzle

RONN

That’s when I see her.

Dark mist swirls all around her form, rising in spinning tendrils, her eyes glowing embers of fire, her claws sharp and protruding from her fingers like hooks.

I hold up a hand, trying to shield myself from whatever threatened to shoot from those misty hands.

“Keilen?” My voice is barely a whisper as the shadows intensify.

Sirgil barks in some distant part of the hut, I’m dimly aware of my fingers closing around the stone in my pocket. The air becomes thick with smoke, with the rotting stench of xanten and something worse.

I launch myself at her, a deep grow resonating in my throat. But I’m here. I’m still standing here.

Sirgil.

Keilen…or whatever that is, turns swifter than the average wolven, faster than I can see and in that one deadly motion, strikes him into the wall to my right, cracking it with his impact.

I gasp and drop to my knees, as the pain racks through my back in one brutal wave. I tigh